The present invention relates generally to electronic photography, and more particularly to a system and method for enabling a user to easily store and retrieve one or more images taken by a digital camera on an archival image storage system.
The present invention relates to electronic photography, and more particularly, to a system and method for enabling a user to easily select and enhance one or more images taken by a digital still camera for printing without using a personal computer or some other complex user interface.
Digital still cameras (DSCs) are rapidly gaining popularity with consumers. They permit high resolution color images to be stored for subsequent printing by conventional ink jet and laser printers. The quality of the color prints that are produced approaches that of conventional silver halide photographic prints. More importantly, the digital images can be permanently stored on different forms of media such as compact disks (CDs), manipulated and altered in a personal computer (PC), inserted into computer graphics and word processing programs, sent to friends and relatives via e-mail, and transmitted over the Internet as part of web pages. From an environmental standpoint digital still cameras are attractive because they eliminate the need for chemical developer solutions.
Commercially available digital still cameras typically have a removable data storage media such as floppy diskette or a flash memory card onto which the digital representation of the images captured by the camera optics and charge coupled device (CCD) can be stored. These forms of media may be removed and plugged into a personal computer so that the digital representations of the images may be viewed. The personal computers may be provided with digital still camera image processing software for enhancing the color balance, contrast, borders and other characteristics of the images prior to storage, printing or transmission. Typically the image processing software that runs on the personal computer allows certain images to be selected and others discarded or ignored.
Other digital still cameras have been developed that may be coupled directly to a printer. These cameras are desirable for consumers who do not own personal computers or feel uncomfortable using such computers. The command buttons and graphical user interface (GUI) menus on such a camera""s liquid crystal display (LCD) are used in accordance with a pre-programmed protocol to select the images to be printed. This type of digital still camera image selection and printing system has the advantage of not requiring a personal computer. It is normally undesirable to print all images, because some are usually poor in quality, and printing all images results in wasted time, paper and ink or laser toner. However, the user is faced with a complex and bewildering set of commands for selecting, downloading and printing images. As an alternative, the printer itself can be provided with a user interface for selecting images from a digital still camera. However this is undesirable because the printer ends up having user-unfriendly interface software. With either approach for coupling a digital still camera directly to a printer, without a PC interface, it is very tedious and cumbersome to vary the characteristics of the selected images to be printed, such as size, brightness, cropping, etc. For the sake of simplicity, such characteristics, along with others, are generally referred to herein as something that will xe2x80x9cenhancexe2x80x9d the original image taken by the digital still camera.
Users frequently wish to archive in electronic form all or some of the digital images stored in the camera or on the removable storage media. Archiving the images on an archival image storage system allows the images to be erased from the camera and the removable storage media, so that the camera can be used to take a new set of photos. The archived images can be retrieved as desired at a future time from the image storage system for printing, e-mailing, incorporating into web pages, or other applications.
It would therefore be desirable to provide a system and method for enabling a user to easily select one or more images taken by a digital camera for storage to, or retrieval from, an archival image storage system or medium without requiring complex user interactions with the image storage system
In a preferred embodiment, the present invention provides a method for retrievably storing digital image files onto a storage device. The invention uses a combination order and proof sheet to provide a simple mechanism for users to select the images they want to store or retrieve. The method for storing includes forming one or more identity markers which, as a whole, identify a set of digital image files associated with the proof sheet, and printing the proof sheet. The proof sheet contains a printed image representing each of the image files; one or more user designation areas markable by the user to select which of the image files will be stored; and the identity marker or markers. The user designation areas preferably include a markable image selection area associated with each image file to select the associated image file, and a storage selection area markable to specify the storage operation to be performed. Possible storage operations include storing all of the image files on the proof sheet, storing only the selected image files, and storing none of the image files. After the proof sheet is printed, it is marked by the user and then scanned to detect the markings in the user designation areas. Those image files which are indicated by the markings are then stored onto the storage device. The storage device may be a hard disk, a CD-ROM, a CD-Rewriteable disk, a file server, or the like.
Each identity marker may also include identification information sufficient to identify the printer or other apparatus which printed the proof sheet, such as the manufacturer of the printer, the model of the printer, the serial number of the printer, a user account associated with the printer, or any combination of these. The marker may be printed as alphanumeric characters or as a non-alphanumeric pattern which frequently is a binary pattern having printed bit markers representing a first binary state and unprinted bit markers representing a second binary state.
As part of forming each identity marker, a data key is formed for each of the image files represented on the proof sheet. The data key may be formed by processing the image file itself so as to calculate the data key, preferably by performing a cyclic redundancy check on the contents of the image file. Alternate versions of the data key may be based on an index number provided by the printer. Some versions of the data keys may include the identification information for the printer. The data keys are printed as data key representations in the identity marker(s). In addition, the data keys themselves may be stored on the storage device in such a way as to be associated with corresponding image files, or may be embedding in the corresponding image file on the storage device. Each data key may also be used to form a file specifier defining the location on the storage device where the image file is stored.
Another preferred embodiment of the invention is a method for retrieving selected image files from a storage device. The method for retrieving includes providing a preprinted proof sheet having image selection areas associated with corresponding image files and corresponding predetermined data keys representations. At least one of the image selection areas on the proof sheet is marked to identify the corresponding image file or files to be retrieved. The marked proof sheet is scanned, and the marked image selection areas determined, and their corresponding data key representations identified. The data key representations are converted into data keys, which are then used to retrieve the image files associated with the marked image selection areas from the storage device.
Each of the data key representations has a printed pattern. To identify and convert each printed pattern to the corresponding data key, each data key representation is located on the marked proof sheet, the printed pattern read, and the pattern converted into the associated data key.
In some embodiments, retrieving the image files is done by converting each of the identified data keys into a file specifier, and reading from the storage device the image file corresponding to each file specifier. In alternate embodiments, retrieving is done by sending the identified data keys to a file server, and locating the image files associated with the identified data keys on the server. Locating may alternatively be done by generating internal data keys from the image file content of certain image files on the server, comparing the internal data keys generated by the server to each of the identified data keys provided to the server; and providing from the server those image files for which the internal data keys match the identified data keys.
Once the desired files are retrieved, the method may further performing an specified operation on each of the image files, such as printing the image file.